


Praeludium ad Infelici

by FuwaFuwaMedb



Series: Suites for Sumer [1]
Category: Fate/EXTRA, Fate/Grand Order, Fate/stay night & Related Fandoms
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-20
Updated: 2019-08-20
Packaged: 2020-09-19 09:07:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,652
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20328601
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FuwaFuwaMedb/pseuds/FuwaFuwaMedb
Summary: Praeludium ad Infelici - A prelude for the unfortunate.For only the unfortunate would merely find the prelude to merely have a happy end for the deal that would be to come about. The tale of an arrogant king, a being forged at the hands of the god of creation, and the woman pulled through the currents of time; intermingling together in the lands of Uruk. Blessed to be together, cursed by the folly of the king; a prelude for the unraveling of fate at the hands of a jealous goddess' temper.





	Praeludium ad Infelici

In some point in time, in a land called Uruk, there lived a great and arrogant king.

The king had hair as golden as the riches of the kings of all the lands and as bright as the sunlight that loomed overhead. The king had a face that artists could only weep upon the sight of, unable to replicate the perfection that only the gods could achieve. His eyes were as deep and as red as the blood that spilt across the land. 

There was a reason his eyes were made that way. 

The king was someone who would bring great spoils to his land, but he would bring with those spoils a great disservice to his people. His appetite was too great for any one person. His desires and his seeking of pleasure was so divine in nature that he devoured the women of his great city, stealing them from husbands and brothers. 

But no woman could quench his thirst for pleasure. 

No person could satisfy his need for more. 

He desired and he sought even further. He reached out his hands as a child would do when reaching towards the sun. But the children are taught that the sun will hurt their eyes and burn their skin. Children are made weak, as all humans are. 

The king was not human though. Born from the union of a divine goddess and the predecessor king, this great king had no limits. 

When he reached into fire, the flames licked his skin before retreating. 

When he grabbed the mane of a lion, the great cat would pay him tribute and present its belly to him. 

There was none who opposed him, not for long, and this made the king very troubled. 

What use is there, he would think, when the world is mine? What treasures loom out there in the universe that I have not already claimed as my own? 

It was this question that the gods asked one another, sensing the distraught people of Uruk and their pleas for help. 

Enki, the great god of creation, came up with a plan. 

With the finest clay in his workshop, the great god formed a beast. This beast was one of great power and great strength, limited in no small manner. He gave it the task to find and fight back against the king. Temper him, Enki instructed his creation. 

Stop his tyranny. 

The creature was set into the land of the humans and roamed the wilds, learning the ways of the beasts. When hunters found them, they fought and lashed out, as the wolves and the beasts had done. 

Our great king, upon hearing of a human-like monster, laughed. 

“Send a temple maiden to them!” 

His great humors humanized the being, making it form hands and feet. The beast gazed upon the splendor of the woman and thought to itself, ‘what a fine human this is. To look as beautiful as the flowers and the blooming sunrise, that is what I should look like too’. 

They changed, creating themselves into a human form. 

A dream came to the king, and he went to his mother, learning that a great force would come that would challenge him. 

A force would challenge him and he would fall, at least to a point, for the being. 

Our great goddess, Ninsun knew this to be true, but she knew the being would fall as well. The two would have no balance, not enough for the darkness she saw passed their point of joy and love. She knew, if she did not act in that moment, there would be no stopping the pain that would scar her son. 

Ninsun, the great goddess, was a mother. 

Mothers are protective beings. They fill their hearts with the hope for their children’s futures. They struggle in our time, praying to the gods for the strength to bring a new life into this world. Being the mother of such a king, she knew his faults, but she could not help herself. 

She wanted him to experience everything. She wanted to give him the world and have those eyes continue to gaze up as adoringly as they had the moment he had fought his way into this world. 

Using her strength, she closed her eyes and opened her power. She sought long and hard to find someone, someone with a perfect ‘no’ on her lips and a beautiful that would beguile and enchant her son in a manner that any husband fell for his wife. 

Someone must be out there who can play counter to his weaknesses, she insisted. 

Her son was a beauty that had no equal, so she sought a woman whose inner beauty shone true. 

Her son was a lion whose roar shook the very mountains, so she sought a woman whose voice ran like the currents under the surface of the Euphrates. 

When her son faltered, she needed someone whose determination would shine through. 

When her son grew boastful and proud, she needed someone who would see through the great proverbial feathers and filibuster. 

But the gods had forsaken her son, she found. 

She ran her hands upon the waters in the temple of Ishtar and found her son’s perfect woman in another time and place, living in a manner that made little sense to her. The goddess of love and war had stolen from her son, sealing any hope for a queen consort from the king. 

Enraged, the goddess waited until the night of the great festival of the patron goddess of Uruk, slipping through the temple doors and delving her hands once more into those all-seeing waters. She pulled forth the woman, pleased with herself as she stole the woman from her time. The goddess adorned the woman in her colors, leaving her in her own temple and instructing her priests to bless her in the name of Ninsun. 

And with that, the king found himself with another dream. 

He did not seek his mother for this one. It was unnecessary, since the dream spoke of a woman with Cedar hair and open arms. His blood sang in his veins in a way that exceeded the lust he found for mere silver and gold. Her body adorned in the colors that could only be worn by those blessed by his mother, the king knew he would find this woman. 

But he did not find her first. 

Upon entrance into Uruk, the woman who had been stolen from her land and time had found herself running into a great and strange being. They could not be considered human, since no man or woman lacked the imperfections of the skin. 

Rather than possessing the marks of humanity, this being looked to be poured into existence, their body without flaw or mark. 

The being looked upon the girl and saw nothing less than the world of the forests they had abandoned. Her hair looked like that of the roots of the eldest trees in the deepest parts of the forest. Her eyes gleamed like the bark of the trees and the great feathers of the owls as the dew shone off them under the light of the rising sun. Her expressions were as soft as that of the temple maiden that had found them. Her touch was gentler than any cloth that they had ever felt. Her hands as smooth as theirs, despite being human. 

The two looked upon one another and a connection of kindred spirits snapped into place. 

A being, created for one purpose and lost to that mission. 

A woman, pulled from the currents of time and space, given no reasoning for this change of world and language. 

The two gathered together within the temple of Ninsun and bonded as brother and sister under fate. They smiled and expressed themselves in a manner that only someone of like mind and open heart could understand. 

When the woman wept, the being consoled. 

When the being expressed loss, the woman explained and comforted them in return. 

There would be no treats and food of the lands of the woman’s time around her, but the being spoke of the trees and of the river. They spoke of the joys of a thousand sunrises and of the fresh grasses that tickled their feet and kindled such happiness into their heart. 

There would be no wolves and beasts to forage and hunt with for the being, but the woman spoke of hunters and soldiers who would need help with feeding their families and protecting them from danger. The world was beautiful, yes, but it also was one that could be quite unforgiving. Allowing the being to join them, perhaps they could save other humans from loss and heartache. 

Yes, the two found great joy in one another, forming a bond thicker than the Cedar forest and the world beyond the kingdom of Uruk. 

What of the king though? 

Well, the dreams plagued him. 

The gods had given him foresight and clairvoyance, but to a limit. He could sense the impending admiration and joys to come, but he could not hold them. He could not experience the splendor of it all but merely watch and wait. 

A king, relegated to that of a peasant looking upon the heavens? 

The complaints were unending, the anger unmeasurable. His mother sat upon her throne, feeling the joys of the mage she had brought for her son and the being whom she had welcomed as a son into her temple; but she could only smile and tell her son to have patience. 

She had waited months for him. He could show patience for the happiness that would come his way. 

Have patience, she told him when he cried of the open arms of his dreams. 

Wait but a small bit of time longer, she told him when he expressed outrage at the friend his mind told him he would embrace as a lover and a brother. 

Those crimson colored eyes watched her like a beast trapped in a corner. 

That blond hair shone as a beacon of her heart as he left her side to return to his duties day after day. 

Tell me when, he would demand. 

Soon. 

Could it happen today, he would demand to know. 

It could. 

Her son did not appreciate that. He did find pleasure in this waiting and holding his breath for what was to come. He roamed his great city, searching the streets in his evenings. 

He found the being first, throwing them into a fight that would shake the very foundation of the city. Their hands locked with one another, their eyes met as they growled to one another and roared in their efforts to out-match one another. 

Ninsun watched in amusement as they came to a stop, their hands locked together and the sweat dripping down their backs. 

Her son’s grin and dragging away of the being was immediate. 

So immediate that the woman that the being had been wandering with became concerned and scared for her friend. She roamed the streets, seeing the wreckage and hearing of the being having been taken in by the king. 

Such damage to the city. 

Such a high-ranking person stealing her friend. 

She feared in her heart that the king would hurt or kill the being. Such a gentle beast, only wanting to fight for what they believed in and protect those important to them, she could not stand it. She stormed the palace with the fierceness of the mightiest lioness, walking through the doors as the guards sought to close the doors to the people. 

The king looked over from where he sat beside his friend and felt his heart stutter in his chest. He watched the great woman knock back the guards, apologizing as she did for their being hindered from their duties. 

Those dark eyes glared over at him, focused and set on a warpath and the king felt himself lost. 

This was what he had wanted, he thought, noting the red and gold attire that made her one of the guests of honor in his mother’s temple. 

This woman was the other treasure his mind had warned him about. Her hair loose and her resolve only shaken when she noticed the being at his side waving a hand at her. 

But she was a woman that Ninsun had sought that would not so easily be swayed to the king’s side. She was a woman who would be difficult, yet rewarding. She would be an endless joy, but she would not be disloyal to herself or to what she believed in. 

The king threw his arrogance to a level that rivaled that of the gods and she threw it back at him, simply turning and leaving. 

The king sent her cloth and jewels that would make the great patron goddess herself prostrate herself before him. The woman sent them back, wrapping them carefully so that they were protected from those who would seek to steal them from him. 

He sent her flowers that exposed the petal-like softness of her skin as the being had described, but she merely gifted them to the temples across Uruk, sending the priests to him to thank him for sending someone to gift their gods such beauty. 

No present could meet her standards. 

No amount of boast or offer of status could lure her in to him. 

While he stewed at the being’s side, he thought longer and harder on what would bring this woman to him. Never had someone shown such selflessness in light of a divine being. Never had someone been able to resist the temptations of this world. 

He looked to his friend and the being merely laughed, knowing both the king and the woman as they did. 

“Go to her and hold her hand,” the being told him. “Show her the world around us take pleasure in her, rather than what you can give her.” 

She sought to be treated as the being did? 

The king frowned at them, but he went forth. His hand wrapped around hers, feeling the sparks that went through his being at the mere touch of her skin to his. 

He held her hand like the precious, fleeting joy that it could threaten to be if he failed. 

He took her forth to the river, speaking of the trails and the people that had littered his land as he had been young. 

To his great pleasure, she faltered in that fortress that possessed her heart. 

She tucked her hair behind one ear and spoke of what she felt at seeing the sun set behind the great ziggurat. She leaned against his side and mindlessly traced her fingers along the callouses that littered his hands from wielding weapon after weapon in his youth. 

When he held her in his arms, he felt her shiver. She felt it too, he thought. She felt this strange spark that was burning into an inferno in his being. She felt that need for closeness, that undeniable sense of rightness that came only as they kept close to one another. 

He pressed his lips to hers and may as well have felt the mead of the gods themselves upon her lips. 

He caressed her face in his hands and may as well have seen the first bloom of the spring in his finest gardens, blooming only in the depths of the night for his eyes along to take pleasure in. 

His joy was insurmountable. 

His need for her was without end. 

Taking her hand, he lured her in finally. He took her into his chambers and he fought harder than he had ever fought before in his life to have her. Her tongue wagged to hold back the needs that they both felt, but he was the ever wise and ever brilliant king of Uruk. He had trained for this his whole life. 

She argued a problem, but he wiped it away like the rains did the heat. 

She expressed anxieties at what she could expect with him, but he caressed and embraced her, soothing away any fears that could dare to steal her from him. 

When those eyes looked up to him, she was bearing the face of a woman on the very edge of her logic and her heart’s innermost desire. 

He pushed her to her heart and soul, pressing his lips to hers and letting her heart beat in time with his own. 

Love me, his heart sang. 

Take pleasure in me, his embrace demanded. 

If he could merely have his own queen consort and his own friend, perhaps the world would finally be enough. 

She gave herself to him. 

No greater pleasure could be found than that. 

She showed him her weak power and he showed her how to strengthen it. Adorning her person in the markings of the strongest temples of Uruk, he strengthened her power and joined her in her magic. He took up the axe, for no other reason than because she gifted it to him. 

Engraving it with the markings found in those temples, she had given him a weapon that could only be exceeded by that of his Ea. 

Pouring her strength into the weapon, she gave him another piece of herself, making both himself and his friend chuckle and grin. 

When they went to fight the great beast of the Cedar Forest, she sat upon his throne and held his turban to her chest. 

When they returned with the head of the beast to give to the god, Enlil; she rushed forth from the crowd and leaped into his arms. 

The goddess of his people saw this joy and this happiness and returned to her temple. Having left her latest catch, the goddess swept a hand across the waters of time and found nothing. The one she had cast into another time and land had vanished. 

No, not vanished. 

She had been drawn here by some other means outside of her control. 

Ishtar moved forth to the king as night fell, propositioning to him. 

Come to me, she told him. Join me in my temple. 

The man merely gazed upon her with the smile of a well-fed cat and pronounced thus: 

“No man wants a woman who cannot satisfy a man. No man wants a woman who takes the pleasures and wonders of the world and shrivels them into the dirt and ash that not even Ereshkigal could find suitable for the underworld. You are the stone that lingers in the man’s gut. You are the splinter that pricks the man as he builds his home. You are the sickness that slows a man’s attack. You are the mud that mars the finest fabrics and the rust that forms on a man’s blade.” 

The fickle king, the foolish and arrogant mixed breed. Ishtar stared at him through his speech, feeling the sick slither of her temper uncurling and slinking forth towards the forefront of her mind. As his words came to an end, eyes gaze was steady, her resolve set in stone. 

“You speak of vile and terrible things, king, but you forget with whom you speak with. I am the goddess of love and war, the one who tends to the mothers and the children and whom protects your great city.” 

“The king and the soldiers protect this city,” he told her simply, sipping at his drink. 

“You speak to the one who spurs the world into the future.” 

“It is a king who leads his people into the future,” he replied easily, that smile only growing in his amusement. 

Ah, but the goddess closed her eyes, turning away from him. 

“Perhaps,” she told him. “But it is the children that are the future beyond your lifetime, isn’t it? Children whom depend upon the great goddess of love and of war whom decides to grant allowance for a mother to bring them into this world.” 

Her eyes landed on the king, noting his pause. 

“Your woman will never bear any child so long as she does not respect me. No seed of yours will be fertile enough. That is my gift, in return for your kind words.” 

The king, enraged, dismissed the goddess’ priests from his palace. He barred them all entrance, amongst any other who bear the goddess’ markings. His eyes gazed upon the youth of his city and he found himself trying time after time. 

The goddess’ curse was too great. 

The being of the god of creation and him both set forth, forging a path against the gods. 

They dismissed all but a few, fending off the responding ire of the gods. The great Bull of Heaven, standing taller than that of the heavens and the mountains, was brought to its knees before the city gates. 

Ishtar rallied against them and they rallied back. 

The king became all consumed, his life now having purpose: Renounce the gods their claim over humanity, fend off the useless goddess from using his people for her own aims, and keep the two treasures of his life, his woman and his friend, at his side. 

“I would like to make a deal,” the woman, his queen consort, told the goddess in the depths of the abandoned temple of Ishtar. “If you will listen, please. There is only something you can help me with, great goddess.” 

A smile formed in the darkness, a pair of knowing eyes gazed upon the mere mage as the goddess coalesced from the shadows. 

“Speak with me then, little queen of Uruk. What could you possibly have to offer me?” 

The venom of the goddess would sink in soon, the end of the other god's creation would be at her hands, alongside this precious beacon of joy for the king. He would grovel soon, she promised herself. 

He would grovel as all men did at her feet. 


End file.
